Desk arrangement

One aspect of teaching I never really thought of till I tried it, was desk arrangement. In my 6th grade class room, we redid our seating chart every two weeks. When I first came in, they were in groups of five. I decided for my first seating chart, I would try rows out instead. The classroom wasn't huge and the rows didn't last long. After the first week, we went back to groups of 5. It seemed weird to me that groups worked better than desks because it's the same number of desks, but the groups allowed me to wonder the room so much more freely. So in my future classroom, I will be a full supporter or groups.

Bulletin Board

At my placement at the Jr High, every class had 33 students in it. Since the classroom was small and had 33 desks in it, it was pretty crowded. In order to save space and since she had a bulletin board in her classroom, my cooperating teacher stapled file folders to the board. Each folder was labeled, for example Geometry absent work, no names, etc. This saved space, instead of having boxes crowding her desk, she put it on her bulletin board!

Behavior Tracker

This was an idea that was used by another 6th grade teacher that I worked with in my student teaching. He had two students that would often not comply when a teacher would ask them to get to work. They would get up and leave the classroom or just close their notes or books and refuse to work. He set up a tracker with the two students and had them rate themselves on how on-task they were during class and percentage of work completed. Each teacher that taught them during rotations had to rate the student on on-task behavior and work completed. This worked well for these two students. The students had to be responsible and honest with themselves and then compare that with what the teacher would give them. The teacher could use this to track how the student is working in class. The teacher also used this to show parents and track behavior that may need to be dealt with. Great data to keep track of behaviors. I was able to see real improvement in compliance.

Students Jobs

While I was student teaching, I noticed that I wasted a lot of time doing menial jobs such as taking attendance, passing back papers, lunch count, etc. To save time You can assign monthly or weekly jobs. You can come up with a few jobs to save time and then rotate the students through the jobs on a regular basis. At my school there was a teacher who did this and she changed the jobs every term. I thought that was a little too long for one student to hold a job, so i would do it every week ortwo weeks.

FIle Folders

To pass out and turn in homework you could have file folders for each student. Each student can turn in their assignments to the turn in folder. To hand back assignments you could have a pass back file folder that the students empty on a specific day of the week to take home. This will save time for collecting work and handing back work.

A Gentle Reminder

In sixth grade I constantly had students that would get off task and disrupt the classroom. Often times I would get down to thier level look them in their eyes and tell them that they are being disruptive and explain why I need to stop ask them to comply and they would.

Class Misbehaving

When the class was out of control and they were all being disruptive I started to go to the board and add more problems for thier homework. If there was no homework I would write the letters E-S-S-A-Y on the board and the student's knew once the problem was written they had to do them for extra homework. If essay was written then they had to write a 500 word essay on a certain topic of my choice. It got to the point that they would see me walk to the board and tell their classmates to behave. In the end I was assigning any extra problems.

Empty Desks

My teacher only has 20 kids in her class, and with each table team set up; it leaves an entire table team empty. She uses this for centers, and if students are having a hard time concentrating at their table, or controlling their body, or have finished their work and would like to do a fun project, they are able to sit at this table and work. Now this doesn’t happen very often, but it would be nice to have the space for this. Its also fits nicely with the traffic pattern. Each desk has a nice walkway where they won’t interrupt or disturb other tables on their way back to this table.

Book Totes

My second grade cooperating teacher didn’t have any bookshelves in her room, and she has a ton of books. She helped with the reading adaptation and is a reading specialist. She has one shelf for the students, and that shelf is filled with little tubs, one for each student. Inside of these tubs are books, both her books as well as their own and library books. At the front of the classroom underneath of her whiteboard and smart board, she has layers of totes that are labeled by category. Inside of these totes are books. Every Monday morning, the kids return the books from their book tubs to the correct tote. They then proceed to get six new books from the variety of categories offered in the totes. I think that this is a great way to manage space, especially when you don’t have any bookshelves and oodles of books. And the kids love that they get to change out their books every week for new ones. It’s also easy for students to understand because each tote is categorized and labeled.

Managing Materials

A first grade teacher that i know is very organized with her materials. She is always on top of things and prepared for everything. She has a lot of parent volunteers in her classroom, so instead of that morning or when the parents just walk, she has a bin that is labeled Parent Volunteers. She has all materials that a volunteer would need in her classroom. She also has a list of what she needs done with the instructions. Once the parent is done with that task they cross off that task. She updates it about twice a month. If she needs something that is not on the list she puts a sticky note or some type of note with what she would like done first. It keeps all the materials together so the parents don't have to look around, or she doesn't have to stop her lesson to help the parent. All the parents know exactly where to find the bin. Melissa Wiser

No confrontations

I have learned that whenever you confront a child being disruptive in front of their peers it is a lose-lose situation. The student loses because you have demeaned him in front of his peers and you also lose the respect of your students for treating someone with disrespect. A teacher should always try to talk to the student in private and never have a power struggle in front of their students. I do believe in quick and short strategies that don't make the students feel threatened.

Two Choices

One of the best things I have learned to do with students who are misbehaving is to give them two choices. Of course, both choices are ones that we want, but the student doesn't realize this. I usually tell them they can do A or B; and then I walk away. By walking away you give the student back alittle power and they feel that they have saved their pride, because they are at least in control of which choice they pick. The students won't jump up and do what you ask immediately, but give them time and they will usually comply.

Math Center

During my first grade placement my cooperating teacher had carved out a clever corner for her math center. She created a "wall" using a low bookshelf, which I'd seen before. She also had a "wall" made of wire mesh storage cubes. She used these to store some of her math manipulatives and games in, but the best part about it was that you could see right through the cubes and watch the students working. I loved that a separate space was created, but I could still monitor exactly what was going on in it.

Individual Behavior Plan

I witnessed the following scenario take place. This was during my student teaching experience, I was in the 6th grade at the time and the following situation took place with a 5th grade student and her teacher (who I must add is a 1st year teacher.) The school had an assembly and the grades were lining up to walk down the hallway to the gym with their chairs. Everything was going smoothly until a particular 5th grade student stopped, set her chair down and began to throw a tantrum. Her teacher handled it by walking up to this student and said, (student's name) THREE, then (students name) TWO. She didn't get to ONE. When doing the count down I observed that the teacher had about 30-45 seconds of wait time between the numbers. The student was intently thinking, and after two she decided to pick up her chair, stop throwing her tantrum and continue walking. After this incident I asked the 5th grade teacher why she counted and what it meant. She told me that there was an agreed upon "behavior plan" for the student. The student came up with the consequences and also the rewards. She knew what would happen if the teacher got to ONE. This plan was put into place about 4 weeks into the year and the teacher told me that they have made adjustments to the consequences one time and the rewards multiple times. The people involved with the individual behavior plan are the student, the students parents, the teacher, and the principal. I think this is a great idea to have so that if any of us get a challenging student who is non compliant we will be able to create an individual plan with them. The biggest point that this 5th grade teacher stressed to be was that the student had to come up with the consequences and rewards and that as the teacher, you must always stay firm, calm, and follow through every time. :)

Give Choices

One great strategy that I learned was to take a step back instead of demanding compliance by the child immediately. I have found that finding what the child may really want to do, such as, recess, p.e. or other activities can be a motivation for the child to work. In my first and sixth grade experiences, I had children that spent too much time complaining and finding ways to get out of the work. I would quietly go up to the child and give them two options. One to get their work done right now or complete it during another time, such as, the beginning of recess. It was their choice. I noticed that most of the children would still not comply the first time. Yet, once the consequences were in place and the child stayed behind to get the work done, I usually only had to remind the child of their choices and they would get right to work. It is also important to stay positive and encourage the child to get the work done. This strategy is probably best for students that are not angry and resentful of school, just having a case of the "lazies" and finding work not "cool".

Time Mangement Schedule

A teacher I used to work with taught me how she manages her time daily. At the beginning of the year, she tries to schedule her preps together so that they are blocked, or later on throughout the afternoon. The sooner you are to sign up, the more likely you will get the times you want. Then, she schedules out her days, blocking together the core subjects in the morning, with few preps. Later in the day is when students will do art, music, P.E., computers, etc. This helps the teacher manage her time because she knows what she will be doing every day, and she is always prepared. Sometimes she will hang a “Do Not Disturb” sign on her door so that there are no interruptions. It can be hard to get your students back on track if someone has come in to the classroom and talked to the teacher or students for a couple minutes.

Nothing to Fiddle with...

A pet peeve of mine is when the students have things in their desk to play with. A second grade teacher has found a remedy for that. She has the students at tables, not desks. Pencils are in a type of squishy cup in the center of the table with the eraser toppers on them. Each table has a different color of topper on top of their pencils to tell them apart. There is a little box filled with each student's box of crayons in it on each table. The pencils and box of crayons stay on top of the table at all times. There is a single desk at the head of each table for all of their supplies that would normally be inside their desks. They have a bin for each student underneath the "head desk," there is a cubby filled with glue and scissors, there is a little basket for each student's homework folder, etc. When it is time to use something then the teacher has one student from each table stand up and get them for each student at the table. It only takes a minute and sometimes the students need the minute to stand up and get their energy out. I love it!

The Music Box

I learned this management tool in my first placement which was a fifth grade class. The teacher had an old music box that you twist the little knob on the back, open the lid, and the music plays. When you shut the lid the music stops playing. She would twist the knob as far as she could on Monday morning and the music had to last until the end of the day on Friday. She would open the box whenever the kids were being noisy. She didn't have to say a word. The kids would get each other to be quiet whenever they heard the music. If they ran out of music before Friday then they lost recess. I loved the idea. I went and bought my own music box for my next placement, 2nd graders, and introduced the idea to them. It literally took one minute to explain and I had them practice being noisy and then opening the box. They caught on very quickly and loved it! I made it more of a reward system instead of only a punishment. They were able to choose what they would earn, free computer time, an extra recess, time to play heads up seven up, etc. We started out with the music having to last 2 days and then moved it up to 3 days. If the music lasted the whole time then they earned their reward, if not then I rewound the music the next morning and it started over. The students loved it and were more sad about losing the music box than about losing me. The teacher was going to buy one over Spring Break. I bought the music box at Walmart in the jewelry department.

Field Trip/ Scholastic/ Money Collected

I read this idea on the internet and thought is was a great idea for keeping money, field trip forms, etc. organized. This teacher buys a box of mailing clasp envelopes and whenever she is collecting field trip permission slips, or field trip money she grabs one of these envelopes. She writes on the front what it is for and then prints out a class list and staples it to the front of the envelope. Whenever a student turns in a permission slip she puts it in the envelope and crosses off that students name. If a student turns in a permission slip and money she crosses off their name and writes "PAID" next to that childs name. She keeps all of the money in a smaller clasp envelope inside the larger envelope. This has worked well for her because it keeps all of the permission slips and money in one place, and also lets her easily see which students are missing forms and money. Traci Newton

Eliminating Wasted Time with PAT

I found this website really interesting. I loved this idea and wished that I would have seen something like this in action so that I could have used it in my first placement. I like the idea of having preffered activity time in the classroom. Sometimes I feel like I am "all business" some days and having this in place each day would be great for the kids to look forward to. Especially the younger ones! Hope you enjoy! Education World: Tools for Teaching: Eliminating Wasted Time : y

Collecting Scores

I learned a great way to enter scores into the computer from my first cooperating teacher.  Any time I had papers that are corrected and scored in class, I would use this method to collect their scores.  I would have all of the students line up alphabetically with their papers in hand starting a few feet away from my desk.  Students had to write how many they missed at the top left of the paper, and their percent out of 100 at the top right of the paper.  One at a time, they would step forward to my computer with their finger pointing to their score and I would enter them into the computer.  I loved this because it meant that I didn't have to collect 30 papers for every subject and find a place to store them.  It also meant that if a student was unprepared, they had to tell me to my face that they didn't have their homework and why.  It also meant that a student couldn't try to blame me for losing a paper, because they never turned them into me.  They were responsible for keeping track of their things.  I liked doing getting scores this way as opposed to collecting papers because I didn't have to jump from person to person while trying to input grades.  Everything was in order down the grade book.  It does take about 3 minutes of your class time once streamlined, but it saves you 10-15 minutes for each set of papers you would normally have turned in.

Giving Time

So, sometimes with the older grades and maybe the younger grades, the kids just love to be social and have opportunities to talk with each other. When I was in my first placement in a 5th and 6th grade split, the kids would often have days where they just wanted to talk. It would make my lessons not go very well and take a lot longer to get through instruction time. My cooperating teacher had one very effective way to keep the kids engaged so that the she could keep the pace of the lesson and get through everything in time. She would use her regular little timer and announce to the class that she needs 15 minutes from them to get through some instruction. She would explain that this 15 minutes could take only 15 minutes or it could take a whole hour. It was up to the kids on how they decided to behave during instruction. Every time the kids would start a side conversation or get off task from the instruction, she would pause the timer and make sure all could see she paused it and then continue as if nothing happened. The kids would notice and remind each other to listen and stay on task and shortly, they would all be listening and participating again. She would then start the time again. If the kids made it until the entire 15 minutes on the timer were up, they earned 2-3 minutes of free talk time. For some reason, the kids loved working for free talk time. This helped me with getting through lessons in the time I had planned for the lesson. It also helped keep me on pace so that I wouldn't take too long on one concept.

Teach and count down

So there are a lot of times that we have to count down and give a time limit for the kids to get in their seats and to be prepared for the next class activity. We may be around the class in small groups working together and then have to go back to our seats. Or it may be time to line up for lunch and we want to do so quickly and orderly. My cooperating teacher in my second placement would use a variety of ways to count down other than the typical five or ten seconds. He would tell the class, "you have a week to get to your seats, today is .... Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday.... Sunday, and now we are back to Monday." It was really good because it would be something different that just the regular count down. It helps to teach kids the days of the week too. He would also say the months of the year and spell out words that have to do with the next activity. I really liked this and started to think more about it. I decided to start using spelling and vocabulary words too. I tell the kids that they have to the count of ... (a spelling or vocabulary word) and quickly use it in a sentence or say its definition and then spell the word. It works great because first, it's more fun for me as the teacher to find new ways to count down and more fun for the students. Second, it also gives a good chance to review or teach a quick concept as you count down. And third, the kids that are always getting to their seats quick and are always the ones waiting for others are along with you either spelling the words or saying the days of the week. It has just made the transitions of the day go more smoothly and fun.

Data Folders

My sixth grade cooperating teacher has the students create their own "data folders." The folders have a divider for each subject taught. Throughout the year the students put assignments they are proud of and ones that show their growth in the folders under the correct subject divider. The folders also contain goals the students have set for themselves, as well as graphs the students create to chart their own growth in different subjects. The teacher uses the data folders during parent teacher conferences as a way of showing the parents their child's progress. These folders helped the students keep their papers organized because they had to go through their cubbies often to keep their data folders updated. Traci Newton

Grouping Desks

In level two, I was in a classroom with limited space. To solve this, my cooperating teacher put teh desks into groups, into four groups. She labeled each of these groups as a house in hogwarts, from Harry Potter. To keep the chaos down, she motivated them using 'house points' like from Harry Potter. At the end of a certain period she would award the winning house! I think this is a clever way to solve her space issue and to help motivate her students!

Materials

During my student teaching, I had the opportunity to observe other teachers in the building. One teacher, in particular, showed me how to NOT manage my materials. I love the teacher-she's great! But her room isn't. I could tell she had a designated area for her stuff, but i felt so claustrophobic when I sat in her classroom. She has stacks of books and supplies with papers sticking out, Larg bins stacked on bookshelves almost to the ceiling, and printed tablecloths to try to cover it all up. It's a wonder she can find or get anything. Alyson Bailey

Materials/extentions

My cooperating teacher has file drawers in her room like every other teacher. However, she devoted one drawer entirely to extentions. She has them ready to go and sorted by season and subject. I think this is a great idea for the willing and fast learner. Alyson Bailey

The Desk Turn

Today in class of our guest speakers talke about the desk turn. This is when a teacher turns the desk around backwards so that students cannot reach insdie of it and be distracted by books, pencils,school boxes, etc. My cooperating teacher used this technique with one of the students in class who has constantly been noncompliant with the classroom rules, and following directions. My teacher one day just turned his desk around. He was not happy!She did however explain that he could easily earn his right to have his desk the proper way he just needed to follow the directions that are given to him and have correct classroom behavior. He was very willing to work to have his desk turned back around. He finished his work and possibly without even realizing it was less distracted by his pencil box and books. I like this idea a lot because I have seen it be effective and I feel that as long as teh reasoning is explained to students and students are able to "earn" their desks to be turned back around I think it is a good technique.

Managing Materials

In my sixth grade placement my cooperating teacher was very organized. Instead of having colored pencils, crayons, scissors and supplies in each students desk each student had a plastic container with a handle with their number on it. The containers looked like very small suitcases. She found them on sale at Walmart and reuses them every year. When it was time to use supplies she would excuse students in groups of five to go and get their plastic box. This made managing materials a lot easier and the students desks were much more organized.

Managing Materials

In my second grade placement my teacher had at least five absent folders. When she took roll she would place a folder on students desk that were absent. Students were taught from the beginning of the school year that if your neighbor was absent it was your responsibility to make sure that all work sheets and homework that was passed back was placed in the folder. This made it very easy to keep absent students homework organized. If parents came in after school to pick up homework it was all right there in the folder ready to go.

Problem of the Week Bulliten Board

I feel that part of managaing materials is managing your bulliten boards. I was in a junior high class, and my cooperating teacher would put up a problem of the week on a bulliten board. If students wished they could do the problem and earn some extra credit. I think this is a great idea not only for junior high, but it would be fabulous to use in the upper elementary grades to extend learning. Since I was in junior high math she would put up math problems from the book "Crossing the River with Dogs", but I think if this idea was used in the upper elementary grades you could put up anything you want to help reinforce your "main idea" for the week. Stephanie Smith